1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to an article supply device that extracts articles according to type by using a visible sensor and a robot and supplies the articles to a supply destination.
2. Description of the Related Art
For example, in an assembly factory and the like, it is general that a robot grasps one of a plurality of articles on the basis of a visual sensor and supplies the article to a next supply destination. Japanese Registered Patent Publication No. 3876260 discloses a device including a rotatable table (a storage unit) having a mounting surface on which a plurality of types of articles are placed, and a partition/passing-through member that forms a gap of a predetermined distance between the mounting surface of the table and the partition/passing-through member. When the table and the partition/passing-through member relatively move with each other and thus an article passes through the gap, the visual sensor detects the article. Then, the robot grasps the article on the basis of information of the visual sensor and supplies the article to a supply destination.
However, when a plurality of types of articles are placed on the table, a situation in which desired types of articles do not always pass through the partition/passing-through member and only undesired types of articles pass through the partition/passing-through member may occur. In such a case, it is necessary to continuously allow the table and the partition/passing-through member to relatively move with each other until desired types of articles pass through the partition/passing-through member. As a consequence, a cycle time is delayed.
Furthermore, since the undesired types of articles having passed through the gap are not grasped by the robot, they return to the upstream of the partition/passing-through member as is by the rotation of the table. Therefore, the undesired types of articles reciprocate many times, resulting in the probability that the surfaces and the like of the undesired types of articles are damaged.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide an article supply device capable of supplying a plurality of types of articles in a short cycle time without the damage of the articles.